The Census Bureau is reporting another positive month for U.S. steel imports. Though improving the data is not only lagging but shows just how far from v-shaped this recovery has been. Unfortunately for the economy (and steel imports) we’re likely to look back on most of the past few monthly data releases in terms of whether they were “pre-Greece” or “post-Greece”. The most recent set of data (the post-Greece data) is showing cracks in the foundation almost across the board.
“The U.S. Census Bureau announced today that preliminary May steel imports were $2.1 billion (2.0 million metric tons) compared to the preliminary April totals of $1.9 billion (1.9 million metric tons).
The May change in steel imports based on metric tonnage reflected increases primarily in blooms, billets, and slabs. Monthly increases occurred primarily with India.
The year to date final statistics through April 2010 showed steel imports of 6.7 million metric tons compared to 6.1 million metric tons through April 2009. The largest commodity increase was blooms, billets, and slabs and the largest commodity decrease was in oil country goods. The largest country increase was with Canada and the largest country decrease was with China.”
Mr. Roche is the Founder and Chief Investment Officer of Discipline Funds.Discipline Funds is a low fee financial advisory firm with a focus on helping people be more disciplined with their finances.
He is also the author of Pragmatic Capitalism: What Every Investor Needs to Understand About Money and Finance, Understanding the Modern Monetary System and Understanding Modern Portfolio Construction.